Members of the non-profit organization Krysta’s Karing Angels spoke with students in front of the UC on Thursday with a crashed car on display to raise student awareness of the dangers of drinking and driving.
Mark Rodriguez, a Houston firefighter, founded the organization with his wife Terri after their daughter was killed by a drunk driver in February 2010.
Krysta Rodriguez was in a car that was hit by a drunk driver on Highway 6 in West Houston. Her brother, Eric, said that as both a firefighter and a brother, his sister’s death hit especially close to home.
“We’re both in the fire department,” he said. “We’re always helping people and when it happens to one of your own, that’s when it really gets to you.”
It is important to understand that the Rodriguez family is only one of thousands that are affected by alcohol-related fatalities. If you drink, either have a designated driver or stay where you are, because that will always be better than killing yourself or someone else because you’ve made an irresponsible decision.
As a society, we need to understand the repercussions of drunk driving. As it is, we’re too accepting of getting behind the wheel after having one too many, and the laws surrounding the issue aren’t enough of a deterrent to keep people from making the same mistake twice or more.
“My Little Krysta, she’s never going to have a second chance to do anything,” Mark Rodriguez said. “And that really makes me angry.”
The responsibility to keep this from happening to our friends and family members is entirely our own — we can’t take this issue lightly, because this passiveness is how people lose their lives to drunk driving.
Krysta’s Karing Angels was created to help family members of victims and aims to spread awareness of the dangers associated with drunk driving.
“If a family suffers a loss like this to a drunk driver, they can call us,” Mark Rodriguez said. “Within 24-hours we’ll be at their house with money and supplies and to tell them the truth — that it’s not going to be OK.
“When they have to bury their child, they’re never going to forget it.”
